CITY PARKS AND PLAYGROUNDS AS By Dr. JAMES M. ANDERS THE necessity for providing sufficient city parks and play THE spaces, including parkways and garden-streets, has been long appreciated by students of municipal sanitation and the truly enlightened part of the general public. We owe the existence of organized bodies for the purpose of promoting these agencies, all of which have been founded within the last half century, to a few leaders in the matter of community health and welfare and in civic advancement. As the result of their well-directed efforts considerable progress has been made in the important direction of providing an adequate proportion of open spaces in relation to the density and aggregate of municipal populations. Efforts to arouse public sentiment upon this vitally important question, however, should have received far greater encouragement than they did in the past. In this connection it should be recollected that in consequence of the free immigration of inferior races our national physique has shown up to now a slow and gradual retrogression. It is high time that an intelligent, concerted effort be made with the avowed purpose of arresting this physical decadence and, more than this, of beginning a new advance. To the student of hygienic and sanitary principles the sources of bodily and moral efficiency are not obscure, and with the aid of sufficient popular support he can indicate the remedies for the cure of the existing state of things with reference to our physical deficiencies. It will not prove difficult to show the connection of city parks and playgrounds with racial progress due to improvement in the national physique. Indeed, it is not too much to claim that a just appreciation of the beneficial effects of these breathing and play spaces of our cities would speedily lead to the acquisition of new areas and the development of land owned by cities for park and play purposes; this would mean a distinct advance in city building with reference to such questions as the number of houses to the acre, their proper grouping, and the extent of open spaces between units, as well as in street tree planting, all of which questions. affect the health and strength of the community, as will be clear hereafter. The thirtieth annual report of the City Parks Association of Philadelphia sets forth the rôle played by the United States Government in physical demonstration of town planning on a large scale carried into execution in several localities, notably Yorkship, Portsmouth, N. H., and Wilmington, Del., during the recent war. Here was established a standard for city planning that it would have required a much longer period of time-quite a generation at least-to attain to in peace times. Attention should be directed to such government regulations as building ten to twenty feet back of the street line, fewer houses to the block and open space between adjoining houses, sixteen feet being the minimum. It is to be hoped that this example set by the government will not be lost, but will serve to inaugurate an era of decided progress in city building throughout our broad land. It is the duty of publicspirited citizens to see to it that modern town plans be adopted in connection with the future building of towns or settlements. True it is that out of appropriate town planning, as necessary sequences, grow hygienic and moral conditions which possess far-reaching influences for good. In other words, if our great American cities were models of city planning the effect would be not only greatly to increase real estate values, but also and more importantly to advance the essentials of human health and happiness. Confirmation of this statement is to be found in an article by Andrew Wright Crawford on "War Suburbs and War Cities," in which he quotes from a book by Charles Cadbury, Jr., the figures appended; they show the effect on children of the Garden Suburbs of Bournville, England, as compared with a ward in Birmingham, only twenty minutes away: An important project of city planning is that of zoning, which "expresses," to quote Herbert S. Swan in the American Architect, "the idea of orderliness in community development." The zone plan tends to strengthen and stabilize real estate values, in short to bring about improvement in real estate conditions and, more important still, encourages efforts to beautify private home sections by street tree planting and the creation of garden streets. Unquestionably, the excellent suggestion contained in a Bulletin of the American Civic Association to the effect that iron fences be substituted for board back fences and board side fences should be adopted. The use of wire and iron for such fencing would not obstruct air-currents as do board fences; and the former "invite flowers and backyard gardens" and "spur competition in cleanliness, neatness and attractiveness." No city should be content without a comprehensive scheme or program for its orderly development to which no single factor would contribute more in the way of beauty and physical benefit than a proper park system including adequate playgrounds. Trees, as all know, appeal strongly to man's esthetic taste, and this is even more true of an aggregation of trees, shrubbery and flowers, such as may be seen in public squares and city parks. The fact that these vegetable forms exercise certain moral effects, especially a softening and refining influence upon human mind and character, is not open to dispute, but it is scarcely appreciated to the extent that it so richly deserves. City parks adorned with trees, foliage plants and blooming vegetation tend to delight the mind, to divert the attention and relieve ennui. Who has not felt keen pleasure at witnessing the gorgeous beauty of a Rittenhouse Square, or a Campanile in spring-time, or failed to experience the benefit they confer in ministering to his or her esthetic taste and gratifying the senses? Here it should be insisted that there is every reason why we should have displayed in our city parks true art, which should be, however, based on the delicate realities or really beautiful things of nature, with a minimum of human imagination and invention. There is opportunity in this connection for the artist who makes a clear-eyed study of the divinely settled trees, shrubs and flowers which enter into the making of our city squares in their true form. While parks serve as a place of rest and relaxation, the presence of trees and flowering plants gives a feeling of companionship often tending to brighten and cheer the lonely hours of many who have little opportunity to enjoy life. The writer fully concurs in the view so happily expressed by the London Medical Record, namely, that "growing plants and flowers is valuable. delassement for the weak and weary." The principal object of this article, however, is to show the value of city parks, open spaces, playgrounds and the like as sources. of health and strength, if rightly used. The view is generally held that a high average physique is the most valuable asset that a municipality, state or nation can boast. Health means freedom from illness, but more than this it means the possession of a reserve force necessary to meet the emergencies of life. The recent war has shown that the American race is distinctly inferior from a physical viewpoint, the percentage of those defective in body among the young men who applied for service being as high as 39 per cent. Experts who have made an investigation into the causes of physical disabilities of our adult population are in agreement that the principal factors are immigration of inferior races and malnutrition, the result of unsanitary conditions under which they live. Improper and inadequate food plays a leading rôle, but it is no more potent as a disabling agency than lack of pure air and sunshine due to congestion. To overcome in a measure at least the evils of overcrowding which prevails so generally in our large municipalities, a sufficient number of open squares-not less than one eighth of the total surface area, appropriately located, is to be advised and encouraged. A proper park system, such as has been projected in Kansas City, Minneapolis and elsewhere in this country should be looked upon as a conspicuous part of the sanitary arrangements of any municipality. It is obvious that a majority of our cities, especially the older ones, are greatly in need of new open spaces in order that their sanitary requirements shall be met. There are a number of ways in which these breathing spaces or city parks with their foliage and flowers, in right proportion to the population and properly distributed, increase the healthfulness of the citizenry, apart from their esthetic influence and their happy effect in relieving congestion. In the first place they render hygienic service by producing shade, which has a cooling effect, and, moreover, sets the air in motion, giving rise to gentle currents. But the full sanitary significance of city parks, garden streets and parkways is not appreciable without a consideration of two plant functions; they are, first, transpiration, by which is meant the constant evaporation of watery vapor which takes place from their leaf surfaces, and, secondly, the power possessed by scented foliage, e. g., pine leaves, and all flowering vegetation (as shown by the writer's experiments)1 to convert the oxygen of the air into ozone, the natural purifying agent of the atmosphere through its oxidizing properties. That growing vegetation gives off oxygen to the surrounding air in an amount sufficient to improve the quality of this medium for breathing purposes is a fact of much sanitary significance, and one that rests upon reliable experimental evidence. 1"House-Plants as Sanitary Agents; Relation of Growing Vegetation to Health and Disease," pp. 133-136. On account of their function of transpiration trees and plants generally, more particularly those having soft, thin foliage, tend to increase somewhat, and to maintain, a state of equability in the degree of the atmospheric humidity in their immediate vicinity. It is high time to abandon the view formerly dominant that an antagonism due to certain plant functions exists between the animal and vegetable kingdoms. There is a deeply rooted belief that plant respiration impairs the salubrity of the surrounding atmosphere. The results of the experiments by Pettenkofer, however, indicate conclusively that the amount of oxygen absorbed from the air and the percentage of carbon dioxide exhaled as the result of plant breathing are too small to exert any appreciable effect. It can be shown that plants, even blooming plants in a sleeping room, so far from exerting an unhealthy influence, are all the while making the air in a better condition for human lungs by dif fusing moisture and generating ozone, not to speak of the affinity resulting from association with these living objects. Parks serve as a ventilating apparatus for cities, introducing, as they do, a greater abundance of purified air than is otherwise possible. Indeed the effect upon the public health and character of an adequate park system is altogether noteworthy. Among suggested memorials to the soldier dead, nothing surpasses either in point of fitness or durability a city park or a parkway filled with its trees of remembrance. City parks if rightly kept would be flourishing monuments of living, lasting green for this and coming generations. Says the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle in this connection, "Not only would such a memorial be a thing of beauty and a joy for many generations by keeping fresh the memories of heroes of the world's great crisis, but it would be a source of comfort in the heart of summer to countless thousands; perhaps, it would save the lives of many in the course of its existence." It is to be hoped that the project of planting trees along our streets and public highways generally will be vigorously furthered. To quote from American Forestry: "By all means let us have trees of remembrance. Let us have them abundantly and for every possible memorial. They are the true monuments, the living memorials God has provided to hallow the holiest memories of every person and of every race." Another source of national health, strength and happiness from the standpoint taken by the hygienist as well as the political economist is children's playgrounds. Experts concur in the view that childhood is the time to begin to build up the physical reserve of a nation, which is to play so important a rôle in personal enter |